Dead Fetus In Bag Found In Victoria’s Secret After Suspected Shoplifting

A dead fetus in a shopping bag was uncovered during a bizarre incident in a Manhattan Victoria’s Secret, but the circumstances leading up to the gruesome find are not yet clear.

Reports indicate that today, a Victoria’s Secret security guard investigated an allegedly suspicious customer at the chain’s Herald Square flagship.

While the guard initially thought the teen girls searched were possibly shoplifting, initial reports said “human remains” were discovered in a shopping bag after a cursory look.

Both girls stopped during the incident are 17, and one of the girls told police that she’d had a miscarriage and was unsure of how to proceed in handling or disposing of the fetus.

USAToday reports that police have not yet determined what precisely happened before the horrific discovery:

“Authorities are trying to determine if one girl gave birth in the store, or if she had been carrying the remains with her. She apparently told detectives she delivered a day earlier, but didn’t know what to do with the remains, police said. It wasn’t clear whether the fetus was alive or dead when delivered.”

Also unclear was whether one or both of the girls were actually shoplifting, or if perhaps either were behaving oddly due to the strange contents of the bag. Some reports indicate that charges against the girls for shoplifting related crimes have been filed.

Details about the gestational age of the fetus found in the Victoria’s Secret bag were not available, but reports indicated that the remains were that of a male, suggesting that if the girl miscarried, it was not early in the pregnancy.

CBS notes that as the guard went to “question them about possible shoplifting at around 1 p.m. [he or she] discovered that one of the teens was carrying a plastic bag with the fetus of a baby boy inside, according to the NYPD.”

The New York Daily News identified the girl suspected to be the fetus‘ mother as Tiona Rodriguez, and spoke with a neighbor, who said:

“She’s a good girl. I can’t believe she would do that. Who the hell would do that? That’s sickening.”

The paper took a screenshot from Tiona Rodriguez’s Facebook page from this week, complaining of “cramps” before the horrifying incident. The neighbor said Rodriguez, who lives with her mother and her son, was kind and not a problem teenager:

“She goes to school. She does what she has to do. She’s no problem… We grew up together. I’ve known her since she was little. She was probably nervous and didn’t know what to do. She would never hurt anyone.”

The paper suggests that the girls were possibly charged with “petit larceny and criminal possession of stolen property.” While Rodriguez said that the miscarriage was unintentional, it seemed that her pregnancy was possibly hidden.

After the dead fetus was found in the Victoria’s Secret location, both girls were taken in for questioning. Rodriguez was transported to Bellevue Hospital, likely for medical treatment after the fetus was delivered, and NYPD officers searched her home in Marcy Houses for evidence.